Metaphilosophy and Argument: The Case of the Justification of Abduction

Abstract

This paper is an essay on metaphilosophy that reviews, de-scribes, categorises, and discusses different ways philosophers have approached the justification of abduc-tion as a mode of reasoning and arguing. Advocating an argumentative approach to abduction, I model the philosophical debate over its justifica-tion as the critical assessment of a warrant-establishing argument allow-ing “H explains D” to be used as a reason for “H can be inferred from D.” Philosophers have discussed the conditions under which such kind of generic argument can be accepted, and I identify five kinds of such conditions, namely: a) dialecti-cal/procedural restriction; b) claim restriction; c) restriction over ac-ceptable explanatory principles; d) balancing restriction; and e) epistemic restriction.